Previewing Florida State

The Deacs (finally) return to the Joel on Sunday for their second ACC home game of the season, and the return home couldn't come soon enough.

A win brings the team's ACC record back to .500 and would hopefully provide a much needed confidence boost for the team. With a loss, however, I worry that the team might fall into a deadly spiral.

This team has been much better at home this season than they have on the road, having not lost any of their 10 home games this season. Nonetheless, I don't see how playing on a different court is going to all of a sudden make us shoot at least 35% from beyond the arc (or just make us not shoot from beyond the arc at all, I'd take either one right now). 5-30 shooting doesn't all of a sudden turn into 8-20 on a flight back from Maryland.

There is no obvious solution to Wake's shooting woes right now, other than to quit shooting outside shots so much. The team actually has reasonably good success when they pound the ball inside. Chas McFarland and James Johnson have shown me more in the paint than Harvey Hale or any other "shooters" have from three point range.

Jeff Teague and Ish Smith are generally much more effective as slashers than they are as shooters, so that's where I want to see them focusing. If Ish can have one of those games with a good number of assists and no turnovers, even though he only scores a few points, it should be a pretty good afternoon for the Deacs.

I think the Deacs will match up well with Florida State. No one on the 'Noles squad really stands out as superstar, instead the team relies on getting 10-15 points from several different people instead of 25 from one. They do this by using four different guards, so stamina could be the only issue I see here. So far this season I haven't seen much reason to worry about the Deacs' stamina, but we'll see.

Jason Rich is a very athletic power forward for Florida State, however the Deacs will counter with a very athletic forward of their own in James Johnson, so I think this could be one of the most interesting matchups on the floor come Sunday.

I expect to see a pretty close game. Florida State has been reasonably close in all of their losses this season, and were even up by a point against Duke late in the second half earlier this week. Like the Deacs they seem to be a team who plays up or down to the level of their opponent sometimes.

This is a game Wake needs, and hopefully home court advantage will hold up. If we do win I will be confident that the advantage we seem to have at home will hold up throughout the ACC schedule and that we really might win seven home games (I'm not sure even the best home court advantage will be enough against Duke). As I've said all along that would only mean we need one road win to be 8-8 in conference, a record that gives us a decent shot at making the Tournament. I think this Sunday's game will say a lot about the team.

Now that we're getting into the bulk of the ACC schedule it's more important than ever that Wake fans come out and pack the Joel to support the team. Make sure to buy your Wake Forest tickets for both home and away games so that the Deacs know how much support they have. If we can encourage them towards 8+ ACC wins we might all need to start looking at NCAA Tournament tickets for March. Let's hope it comes to that!